The concept of sitting on the side of the ski slope and resting has been around as long as the sport itself. Being able to rest on the slope is not only a pleasure but often is necessary, because of safety concerns. This is based on the probability for personal injury which greatly increases with increasing levels of fatigue. Having a comfortable ski chair system readily available would greatly increase the ability to take a well-deserved and needed rest before personal injury occurs.
Currently there is no ski chair system on the commercial market that is compact enough to carry while skiing. Backpacks having a fold down flap to allow one to sit on the snow have been used but provide no long-term comfort. Other efforts to provide a skier a temporary seat without sitting directly on the snow are embodied in the structures found in U.S. Pat. No. 4,786,082 wherein a seat is jointly supported by a pair of ski poles, U.S. Pat. No. 4,456,284 in which a temporary seat is formed in the nature of a sling suspended by a pair of sleeves supported by a ski pole upper end, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,762,339 in which a seat made from flexible material is supported by both skis and ski poles. These designs make for an extremely unstable configuration since the weight distributed by one sitting on the seat forces the skis and ski poles in opposite directions causing the seat to collapse and therefore not desirable to sit on. In addition to being unstable, these designs are limited by the location in which they can be used since one needs to insert the skis and ski poles into the snow in order to provide support.
Another type of ski chair is disclosed in German Pat. Reg. 656406. In this design the tips of the skis are pointed skyward and the tails used as the base support. A problem with the design disclosed in this patent is that the use of only one ski pole as a back support does not provide the adequate support needed for the weight of an average skier. The other ski pole is used to maintain the separation for the base support of the skis. This method does not create a comfortable nor a stable configuration for a seat.
Accordingly, it is the object of the present invention to provide a portable ski chair that can be carried by a skier, assembled, disassembled, stored and then carried when desired. Such a seat must be small and have minimum parts so that it can be easily transported and provide for an effortless assembly and disassembly.